


My Persephone

by Akely



Category: Gintama
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angels and Demons, Drama & Romance, Eternal Yorozuya Doujin Circle, F/M, Fantasy, Might take an M turn, Mythology - Freeform, and more...
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-09
Updated: 2020-05-09
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:47:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,159
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24098335
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Akely/pseuds/Akely
Summary: The lord of Hells, Okita Sougo, is plagued by strange dreams of an angel with red hair. "Find her," a voice whispers to him, "find Persephone."A fantasy AU mixed with mythology. Might take an M turn.
Relationships: Kagura/Okita Sougo
Comments: 4
Kudos: 34





	My Persephone

_It is time for us to finally meet, my Persephone._

It was hot, too hot. He was burning on the silky sheets of his bed, everything he touched was scathing and left him writhing in pain. It was a kind of pain he never experienced before, something far worse than flames— the pain of yearning. His heart was shaken, wrought, and tortured by her. It was not the first time it happened but lately he saw her everywhere, every time he closed his eyes she would appear, and disappear once he reached for her. He would wake up frustrated, left with a blurry memory of red hair, a white dress, and flowers.

And there was this voice calling for her, it wasn't his yet it sounded so familiar, as if it belonged to him. _Persephone_ , it whispered gently, _find Persephone. Find her, find Persephone_ , the voice repeated like a mantra even though Okita had no idea who was Persephone. He did not know anyone whose name sounded so ancient, nowadays angels and demons alike wore names from the world below, the humans.

The flowers surrounding him were spectacular as well, he had never seen them anywhere before, not in his realm nor at the living's, and she was there standing in this field admiring the sun settling down as he eased closer.

_Who are you?_ He wanted to know why would an ancient being, someone far greater than them, the Wingeds, would bother bewitching him this way. He wanted to be freed of all this fire, he couldn't breathe anymore without thinking of her.

"Persephone?" He managed to talk, for the first time, and the girl did not seem moved at first.

"Wrong," she said, her back facing him as a large pair of pure white wings spread. The wind shuffled and danced with petals, colors started staining his sight but he kept walking closer until his hand caught her shoulders. "Not yet."

_Why?_

"My name," she shook her head and turned towards him but the petals clouded his vision. "Call me by my true name. Find me soon," she told him at last before he was pulled from the realm and Sougo woke up once again, sweat-drenched and irritated.

A lovely voice, red hair, white wings and at last, blue eyes. The most beautiful, deepest shade of blue he had seen and definitely more precious than anything he owned as the lord of Hells.

An angel.

The pure, immaculate wings only belonged to Wingeds who bothered with the livings— the angels, as humans called them. He did not meet them often, for their job was completely different: they demons only took care of the dead. They judged spirits and sent them to their corresponding hell to rest, and when angels needed it they would replenish the human world with purified souls. Angels and demons met rarely, but they had to— each two seasons he was summoned along with the most powerful archangel, Hijikata, to discuss about the management of the human world.

It had been quite some times since he last saw the annoying man, always dutiful and grave, and a moralizer to top it off...

"Today," Okita rose up startled in his bed and dashed towards his study. The calendar was a large artifact made of stone, each heavy and large needles moving with the flow of time. He stared at second needle, the one for seasons, and noticed it was soon reaching Autumn. "The summon is today."

Okita fell down on the cold floor, watching the orange hue of core slowly turning to blue. If his dreams were real, if they made any kind of sense somehow then he would finally see her. She was an angel, and though he never saw her before, she could be brought to the Summon and then— then— he could finally quench all these feelings he did not need of.

The palace was silent in the wee hours of the night and the Summon due in three hours hours, Okita slipped into his formal outfit and tied up his cravat, though born with less needs than living beings the Wingeds still needed to eat, drink, and sleep to some degree. Okita was feeling the consequence of all those sleepless nights. Irritation filled him when he passed the halls and reached his "office"; a large throne dominating the vast room covered with velvet red carpet and at the center was drawn a large circles with strange scripts.

Guards saluted him, and a demon with silver, permy hair yawned while making his way toward him.

"Unusually working hard I see," Gintoki said with an almost disappointment.

"I have to reach my quota before leaving for the Summon, Danna," Okita told a guard to bring the next soul.

Gintoki was his advisor and the former lord of Hells before he was born, being much older than Okita, Gintoki helped him in his work and occasionally served as temporary lord when events such as the Summon happened.

"The soul arrived, sir," Yamazaki bowed and a translucent being appeared in the circle. Okita sat down on his throne— the throne that only belonged to the lord of Hells, the judge of all souls. The runes floated and shone brightly, awaiting for him to grab done, it flew toward Okita, laid down on the parchment and printed words.

"I see," Sougo read the parchment with a frown, "you died at the age of eighty out of natural cause. You have been known as being useless, a parasite," the soul, an old man who wore strange sunglasses lowered his head— "your unemployment and addiction with alcohol, smoking and gambling led your wife to abandon you and raise your only child for years in misery."

"I know," the soul's strained voice echoed as he shamefully kneeled to the demon. "I know what I have done—"

"I am not finished," Sougo cut him, and continued to read from the parchment, "however you have managed to redeem yourself during a terrorist attack and became a heroic figure. You gained back your rank within police force and save lives, as well as bringing back your family together. You cherished your wife and raised your daughter to become a future doctor and then peacefully died."

Gintoki yawned from his seat, situated all the steps below the throne and started counting on his fingers all of sudden, "that makes -300..-150, 47...84... 140 after saving a class of elementary kids... 255..364..404. So, your life's value was 404 points. You should be happy, that's enough to be sent to the greater side of the Meadows."

Okita shook his head, "you'll be sent to Elysium. It is where the heroic, prestigious or noble souls rest— it is calm and soothing, you won't ever have to ache again. If you go there and nurture your soul, you can be given a chance to be reborn. Of course, you can choose to stay too."

The soul shook his head erratically, "I want to be reborn! I have to make up for all these years, I promised I will meet Hatsu again!"

Sougo nodded, "I see. Zaki," he called familiarly, "take him to wait for the next boat."

The guard bowed, guiding the soul gently while a new one was to be brought. Okita stared at the parchment and, blowing gently on it, sealed it under the name of "Hasagewa Taizou" before releasing the grasp he had on it. The parchment, bits by bits, disappeared from his hand, and Sougo knew it had gone to the Archives where rested all the souls' memories.

Being the lord of Hells did not bother Sougo. Judging souls happened to be interesting at times, it felt like reading books. A lot of books, because deads arrived quick and needed a place to rest before they could get lost which was why the angels had imposed him a quota. He did not always meet it daily, but he would monthly. Death was too important to be ignored for long.

Okita still has thousands and thousands of souls to judge, but after all time was slow for Wingeds. One day in the Underworld or the Uppeworld meant ten years for humans. And it did not matter anymore because what was obsessing him was that girl, that angel he might or might not meet at the Summon.

Persephone. It rolled smoothly with his tongue, as if it was familiar, and yet it sounded _wrong_. She said so herself; he had yet to find her true name. _Who are you?_

* * *

"Toshi!" The girl sprang from the fields, arms wide opened, and dashed towards the archangel for a tight embrace. "You took long, I had the time to make lot of flowers," she complained while showing her flower coronet— vibrant colors hit him, corals and reds mixing beautifully with pale and shy colors. The delicate scent reached him, her flowers had become more feminine and mature with time. They no longer smelled like fresh fruits and sugar.

"Taking care of humans isn't as easy as you seem to think," Hijikata scolded her gently. "You created everything there right?," his arms broadened as to to imitate the fields they were in. Kagura's fields extended infinitely toward the horizon, the grass was greener than anywhere else in the universe, covered in all kind of plants. Tall and small trees, bushes, vines and flowers, Eleusis was one of the most praised realm in the Upperworld. "Good work. But more than half of these prototypes aren't even named, am I right?"

Kagura stepped out from the hug and pouted, crossing her arms, "I will give them a name when we need it. For now they're all Sadaharus."

Hijikata sighed but the shiny halo of the young angel caught his attention. It was bright, so bright that rays seemed to be darting from it which he knew, it was no easy feat; especially for an angel less than ten thousand years old. He himself had taken millenniums to grow into the archangel he was now.

"Show me your wings. I told you yesterday that if you cultivated enough I will bring you to the Summon."

Kagura immediately cheered up. She closed her eyes, focused, she took one deep breath before snow white wings spread suddenly. They were large and big, towering the angel as it opened fully. They were one head taller than she and infinitely broader in width; there was no doubt that Kagura deserved to go to the Summon with him with such a pair though, one detail always made him relent in the end.

"You are strong," he declared, "but you don't even have a second pair to be considered an archangel." He himself had three pairs as the strongest archangel, and Kagura, though still far from his level, had long surpassed all his fellow archangels. Her wings were bigger and her halo brighter than theirs but it was as if all remaining wings pushed all their energy into this unique pair.

"That's only a detail Toshi!" She whined, it had been five centuries since she first asked him permission to go to the Summon with him and he never allowed it, on the excuse of not having a second pair of wings when she was more powerful than most archangels already. "I want to go, I won't do anything. I'll just sit there and listen."

Hijikata sighed, his hand messing his dark hair, "why do you want to go there so badly?"

"I want to know what the world is like. What demons are like." Kagura stared at him, her eyes were firm and the blue was forget by an iron will, "You told me make things for humans when you brought me there Toshi, so I tried hard to make things from scratches until I filled Eleusis. When we came there for the first time it didn't have anything, but now look," she stared at the heaps of plants covering the real, from the fields to the lakes and over the mountains, "Yet I don't even know what the world looks like."

Hijikata felt a pang of guilt as she spoke, he was the one who brought Kagura to this realm and tasked her with filling it for humans, keeping her there. He didn't want her to meet demons or humans, and all the ugly of humanity and the world he knew of. He had been the master of the Upperworld since a long time, so long he didn't even count time anymore and when he met her, that lost child who did not know anything, he didn't want to give her up. It was selfish of him, really, to try and keep her ignorant of all the harms and the rotten of the world.

"Fine."

Kagura's smile widened. "Really?"

"Yeah," he lifted her from the flower-flooded floor and showed one of his rare smile.

"Thank you Toshi," she cackled in her adorable fashion, Hijikata felt like she was growing too fast for him.

"It's time to go," Hijikata let his wings spread. His first pair was the largest and was situated around his shoulders, while the two other descended until reaching the small of his back, and though slightly smaller it allowed him to travel faster than anyone else. "We're going to the castle, that's where the portal is."

Kagura nodded, her own wings fluttered before she could fly. As soon as she was up in the sky with Hijikata she felt her silk toga flap against her body, breeze grazing her skin and she danced with the wind. She had always liked flying but today it tasted like freedom. Induced by her great mood her guardian smiled lightly for the whole, which was quite a big deal for someone as stern as Hijikata.

She saw Eleusis. All of her Eleusis. From so high it resembled a large canvas covered with lush green grass and all the plants she had created looked like the colorful splatters of paint of an artist; passing through the mountains and lakes she saw villages. Those were destined for small angels who did not have much to do besides some small menial tasks. Past the scattered villages was the main city; Olympus and its strong walls in volute to protect its inhabitants, archangels or archangels-to-be, their luxurious _domus_ and gardens from the undesirable.

And then there were the steps, each beautifully sculpted steps resting on a cloud until it rose higher, high enough for the castle. Kagura and Hijikata were welcomed by impressive pillars, its triangular shaped roof ornate with sculpture of the main archangels; the hallways were titanic compared to them, but Kagura prefered to admire the paintings on the walls which told the story of the Wingeds, and all the rich, vivid tapestry.

The walk was long, for the castle was exceedingly big nonetheless Kagura had loved it thus found it almost too short as they reached the deepest room. Hijikata used his power to open the door, blue light emanated from his palm shortly before the door moved by itself and let them enter; Kagura had expected something special but it wasn't. The roof had a hole, sun rays darted and illuminated the room which was almost empty except for the large block of marble in the middle. It had been sculpted, like everything else in the castle, but as they eased closer Kagura noticed it had been holed out and the block was something akin to a small lake— with still water reflecting clear blue sky.

"This is the portal that leads to the human world," Hijikata explained, "it connect our sky and theirs so as soon as we fall in it we will be into the human's sky. The Summon takes place on an island there but you won't see anything, except for some animals. Humans cannot see it."

Kagura dipped one feet inside, when she looked at it the pool did not feel deep but once her feet was in she did not felt water; instead she felt the wind of the sky. Hijikata nodded at her and he jumped in, with her following shortly after.

And she fell.

They were in free fall and luckily, Hijikata caught her and waited for her to stabilize and fly again. To her disappointment she did not see anything that could tell her about the humans, instead it was just oceans in gradient of blue and green; they went down and lower until Kagura could smell the scent of sea and finally reached the sole island there, in the middle of nowhere.

Kagura felt the sand underneath her feet. In Eleusis there was no such thing as sand, it felt soft and grainy and slipping between things, it wasn't a bad feeling but it felt strange.

"Ah right," Hijikata messed her hair, "you don't have shoes."

In one movement of the arm, pink sandals had laced themselves up her knees; Kagura felt almost disappointed because she wanted to try and experience the world as much as she could. The far cries of birds; however, immediately soothed her.

"Those are seagulls," Hijikata felt like explaining while making their way to the forest. Kagura smelled scents she had never smelled, heard noises she did not heard before ("they are from various insects," he told her) and was comforted by the familiarity of the plants even though they did not all belong to her.

"It's there," they arrived at a clearing with a rather simple setting: one large table covered with a white napkin and sun loungers besides. From Hijikata's hand the blue light shone again, flowed to the table until different kind of dishes appeared. They were only food Wingeds were allowed to eat; food that came from the Upperworld and to be more precise, from the fruits of her Eleusis.

"You are late," a deadpan voice rang from the oppositeopposide side. "Who told me that, already? 'you do not deserved to be a lord if you come this late!'" The voice was mocking but somehow the man who spoke kept the stone still and very much dead. Kagura frowned.

"That's because I brought my protégé," Hijikata scratched his neck and sat down. "She'll be watching us today."

"Oh?" The shadow stepped closer, until shadow he was no more, but instead the figure of a young man in strange clothing, horns, dark wings and tail entered her sight. He looked similar to angels yet was different, Kagura deduced he was a demon and not anyone— the lord of the Underworld himself.

He did not sit down. His eyes, red and piercing she never saw before on anyone else were fixated on her and even as he did sit down the man held his stare. He looked troubled, Kagura thought.

"Who are you?" He asked her, his voice finally sounding alive, "I mean, what's your name?"

"I'm Kagura!"

The man smirked, "I'm the lord of Hells, Okita Sougo."


End file.
